Penalties of June

Brandon follows up Citrus County with another entertaining caper set in Florida. It’s 1998, and newly paroled Pratt Zimmer, 25, wants to start fresh in Hernando County after almost three years behind bars after he was caught moving cash for a crime boss. His former employer, Arthur Bonne, tracks him down and demands he pull off one final job—a murder—to earn his freedom from a life of crime. Soon, Pratt is trailing his mark, a shady accountant who’s been gambling Boone’s money away, while searching for a way out without having to pull the trigger. Between stakeouts, Pratt pals around with his high school classmate Tony, who supplies Pratt with surveillance gear from his pawn shop, and he rekindles a relationship with his longtime crush Kallie. With the addition of Gianakos, a possibly crooked detective pressing Pratt to flip on Bonne, the novel’s spiderweb of story lines builds toward a predictable but satisfying conclusion. Brandon’s knack for quirky details, from Pratt’s habit of losing his sunglasses to Gianakos’s penchant for anointing him with silly nicknames (“Pratt Sajak,” “Pratt Morita”), adds levity to the otherwise dark subject matter, and the prose bursts with sharp descriptions of the Sunshine State. This noirish romp hits all the right notes. (Nov.)